31 Days of October, Day 10

[impy]

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I love the various Buffy Halloween episodes. Which is probably a no-brainer, but honestly, it needed to be said anyway. :P But we haven't time for all my Buffy love or we'd be here the rest of forever because my love is very conditional and also I hold a very, very unpopular opinion in the land of Buffy-fandom, which is why I don't play there much. Actually, I think I hold a few unpopular opinions now that I think about it.

Anyway, if nothing else, Halloween!Buffy taught us to be careful what we choose as our costumes (in case there's a curse that makes us what we've worn) and also given us a brilliantly slacker costume that would probably be quite dangerous if the first scenario came true:

Comments

[irishgypsie.livejournal.com]

What's your very very unpopular opinion? I must knoooow.

I pretend the 7th season doesn't exist and the show ended at 6. I ship Willow/Oz (Tara's sweet, but I really really love Oz.) I also love Buffy/Riley. I'm not sure if any of those are unpopular views or not; I've never spent time in the fandom. So you can share with me - I promise I won't judge. Who knows; I may end up agreeing with you!

[snarky-imp.livejournal.com]

I mostly pretend the series ended sometime before Tara died, possibly after the musical? Unsure. It's possible the Buffy fandom, or at least the circles I observed, has changed while I've been mostly ignoring it, but based on Tumblr answers (there's a scientific study if ever there was one!) I think the good ship Willow/Oz has many a fan while seasons 6 and 7 (musical and Tabula Rasa being the exceptions) do not. For awhile being a fan of Buffy/Riley would get you a serious case of side-eye.

Not sure if it's true anymore, but for a very long time you could get away with quite a few things in the Buffy fandom so long as your skin was thick enough. The one thing you couldn't do, however, was not like Willow.

I'm not talking about hating her, because I don't. My two favorite 'ships in the Buffy and Angel 'verse are both Willow ships (Oz/Willow and Tara/Willow, in that order) but on her own, Willow is either hitting way too close to home in the early years or... I have no idea what it is after awhile. She's just not anywhere near my favorite character and expressing that opinion was likely to get you mauled by Buffy fans.

[irishgypsie.livejournal.com]

Wow, I didn't know it was a crime to not love Willow. She's not my favorite either, but I like her better in the early years than the later ones. Season One Willow is very much like how I was in high school, so I relate. It was nice to see someone like me portrayed in a positive manner on TV. Plus she's with Oz in the early seasons. :)

My favorites are Spike and Anya. I was very unhappy with Xander when he left her at the altar, and then the way she was just so quickly killed in season 7, almost like she was an afterthought and not important enough for a meaningful death scene. Blink and you missed it. I thought that was really uncool too.

[snarky-imp.livejournal.com]

Oz! ♥ Favorite character in the series, hands down.

Not sure if it's still a crime to not like Willow, but at least in the parts of the fandom I lurked in, it was a punishable offense. I think I learned that during one of those "who don't you like?" kinds of threads and everyone was putting Dawn (I happen to like her, so there's another strike) or other easy answers and either someone else put Willow or they did and were kind of joking and things just went nuclear. It was amazingly awful. And since I'd been about to put the same answer, it was a bit like following someone and being three steps behind them as they step on a landmine. Not. Pretty.

I loved Spike til Spuffy happened. I liked him wanting her and her not returning the favor and the moment they did, not to mention the events of Seeing Red, I lost interest. I mostly pretend Seeing Red didn't happen, though.

Annnnnd I'm not all that fond of the Anya/Xander 'ship sinking just so Whedon could claim another couple bit the dust. It never rang true for me. I'm torn on Anya's death. On the one hand, Emma wanted out and considering most of the remaining characters didn't like/love Anya so it made some sort of sense. On the other hand, fans loved her, Xander loved her, and it was not cool to just gloss over her death. So once more, I go back to the whole S7 never happened. Never. Happened.

[irishgypsie.livejournal.com]

I like Dawn too. :)

And I'm with you on Spuffy too. Actually I think if Dawn had been a bit older I'd have liked to see Spike/Dawn (Spawn? Haha.)

I have mixed feelings about Faith though. I like the concept of a rogue slayer, but I didn't really buy her motivations in becoming so, since she started out nice and normal. I'd rather have seen her as rogue from the very start or to have a better transition. As it is it just feels kind of contrived. And then to have her come back in season 7 all cured was weird. So, yeah, season 7 never happened.

[snarky-imp.livejournal.com]

I could see Dawn having a thing for Spike, especially after Buffy's death but the age thing warps my view on whether I'd see it as Spawn thing. *muse*


I love Faith but S7 Faith, and it's been awhile since I don't think I've ever rewatched that season, felt... weird. Which was probably the point, given how the potentials overthrew Buffy to declare Faith their queen and again, I still say the show views the world through Buffy's eyes so the perspective is skewed. But it still seemed odd, even when you factor in her redemption over on Angel. And her episodes there were amazing.